No, I will not take them back there
From where we were lured away
To these cruel shores
Which brutally abort them too
Outcasts
Lepers ostracized
For time has trapped them
In a regime where their progeny and place
Are in a riotous
State of disequilibrium.
Suffering, maybe suffering alone
Can make them
Divine paths
And decide courses
For survival
Into the future
Where to plant their seed
And see it grow settled
Into meaningful fruition.
©SAMIR R. MTAMBA
Samir R. Mtamba was a Zimbabwean poet and prose writer of Malawian descent. Born in Harare, Zimbabwe, in November 1959, he published in Australia Kunapipi, in America World Literature Today , Germany RODOPI, Ireland, and South Africa among other places. He started writing poetry in primary school. He studied at the University of Malawi, Chancellor College and was active in its Writers’ Workshop where he edited the English Department’s critical broadsheet, The Muse from undergraduate to postgraduate years. He briefly attended Dalhousie University in Nova Scotia for his Graduate Studies. Samir taught in Zimbabwean high schools and at Zimbabwe Open University (ZOU). He was also an independent researcher interested in the writings of J.M. Coetzee, Ayi Kwei Armah and R.K. Narayan.
“Poetry is useless if it is not committed to addressing the immediate problems that we face as human beings in society at the hands of unscrupulous leaders/politicians of every kind, colour and creed. Free verse with discipline and commitment can do better than traditional verse.”
Samir died on 27 August 2017, at the aged 58.
Compiled by Chimwemwe Mtamba.